


Words to Live By

by ArchangelUnmei



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Gen, Introspection, Post-Dawn, Survivor Guilt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-11
Updated: 2020-07-11
Packaged: 2021-03-04 20:07:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25202158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArchangelUnmei/pseuds/ArchangelUnmei
Summary: Cor's received a lot of advice over the years. Some of it he's taken to heart, some of it he's ignored, but all of it has shaped who he became.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 23
Collections: The Lion's Sigil Zine





	Words to Live By

**Author's Note:**

> This is my piece for the Lion's Sigil Cor Fanzine. :D It was my first ever zine piece, and a ton of fun to do.

Cor closes his eyes against the harsh light of the Dawn and tries to swallow around the catch in his throat. He’s here, alive where he never expected to be, and he wonders what the hell he’s supposed to do now.

( _“Temperance,” Gilgamesh had hissed at him, one cold metal hand closing around Cor’s throat, lifting him until the kicking toes of his boots barely brushed the ground. His mask, cold and expressionless, would haunt Cor’s dreams for years, his words a whispering echo in the darkness of every night. “Restraint is not the same as discipline. Learn the difference or you will not survive.”_ )

Iris shakes against his side, overcome by emotion and exertion, and Cor wraps his arm around her shoulders to pull her in close, ignoring the twinge of minor injuries. They sag together and hold each other up, barely able to believe the long night of fighting is finally at an end.

( _“Idiotic fool of a boy,” Cid grumbled, not quite under his breath, and smacked Cor lightly on the shoulder. Cor yelped and jumped, groaning as the motion jarred his already sore ribs and assorted other injuries._

_“What was that for?!” he asked furiously, and Cid just stared at him with a narrow-eyed expression, then bent down again to continue wrapping Cor’s cracked ribs._

_“Sit still.” Both of them fell into stubborn, angry silence, and Cor’s eyes drifted to where Regis had disappeared over the edge of the haven. Gone to check on the car, Clarus had offered lamely before following the Prince, but Cor had seen Regis’ eyes. Seen the worry and the fear, the upset tears at Cor’s injuries that he wasn’t willing to show anyone but Clarus. It was the only thing that sent a little thread of guilt curling through Cor’s belly._

_“In the future,” Cid said after awhile, his voice low and gruff but his hands so gentle where they continued to patch Cor up. “Y’might want to give some thought to how your actions affect those around you, ‘specially the ones who care for you most.”_ )

Cor takes a deep breath, feeling the tension of a long night of fighting ache through his ribs. Everything hurts, his hands sore from clenching around his sword, his ankles and knees throbbing from thirty-five years of war. And all he can think about, watching the sun rise, is the ones they’re leaving behind in the dark. The ones who didn’t make it. The ones that Cor loved best. The ones he couldn’t save.

( _“This is ridiculous posturing, and you know it!”_

_Clarus looked up as the door to his office slammed open, regarding his newly minted Marshal Leonis standing in the doorway, nostrils flared in anger and a sheaf of reports crumpled in one hand. He gestured wordlessly for Cor to come in and have a seat, and though Cor did stalk inside and slam the door behind him, he was clearly too restless to sit. Clarus folded his hands on top of his desk and waited for Cor to find his point._

_“This,” Cor waved the bundle of papers. “Is useless. Worse than useless. Why is all we’re doing pulling back?! We should be hitting them back, Clar, they’re killing us!”_

_Clarus sighed, his own shoulders sloping momentarily as he ran a hand through his hair. “Niflheim has greater resources than we do, Cor. They have more men, and that cursed magitek stuff. We have to be strategic and work with what we’ve got.”_

_Cor let out a bitter sound that might have been a laugh, finally dropping into a chair. “Maybe we’re just delaying the inevitable. Maybe nothing we do matters,” he muttered bitterly._

_“If nothing we do matters, then all that matters is what we **do** ,” Clarus watched the confusion flash across Cor’s face. He let the words sink in for a long moment, then pulled open his desk drawer to retrieve the file he’d been planning to pass along to Cor anyway. “Here. There’s an outpost I want you to check out, we think it might have something to do with how the Empire is producing so many MTs.”_

_Cor took the file to flip it open, Clarus’ words stuck in the back of his mind. He didn’t think about them much, but they returned full force when Cor realized he couldn’t do anything about the sprawling facility he found, the research, the atrocities being committed… but he **could** save one life._)

Iris makes a small sound beside him, a little hitch of breath that she tries to hide. It sounds louder than it has any right to, in the silent courtyard. There are no birds, no scrambling rodents or droning insects, like they’re the only two living things left in all of the ruined city. Cor swallows, the sun warm on his skin, but even after so long the welcome warmth can’t chase away the cold that’s settled into his bones.

( _Three weeks before the Fall of Insomnia, Regis called Cor into his study, and finally told him their plan._

_“...I would have stayed with you until the very end,” Cor said softly after a very long silence, staring fixed at some point on the opposite wall, above Regis’ head._

_“I know,” Regis answered, his voice both kind and sad. “And that’s why I’m sending you away. Noct and the others will need help out there. They’ll need Marshal Leonis, but they’ll also need their Uncle Cor.”_

_Cor swallowed, pretending his vision wasn’t going blurry. Regis shifted closer, not quite close enough to touch._

_“Cor… You’ve always done what your heart told you was right. More than any sworn duty or allegiance, you do what you believe will benefit the most people, even at personal cost. I’ve always admired that. Please understand, there isn’t another way.”_

_Cor's words remained lodged in his throat, only made worse as Regis moved closer, and put an arm around him._

_“I hope you don’t ever change. I’ve been so honored that our paths have walked together for so long, and I wish you didn’t have to go on alone, but you’ll be fine.” Regis leaned closer, rested his cheek against Cor’s shoulder, and with a start Cor noticed for perhaps the first time that he was taller than the King. “I’m so proud of you.”_

_It’s not the last time they see each other, and Cor never says good-bye. He doesn’t remember what Regis’ actual last words to him are, because that conversation echoes so loudly through his soul._ )

Cor runs his fingers gently through Iris’ hair, like he had when she was so much smaller, trying to soothe her when he feels far from soothed himself. Now that the sun is rising, now that the daemons are gone and the battle for Insomnia is over, it’s like they’re both stuck. Facing the future, but unwilling to let go of the ruins that lay behind them.

( _“No matter what happens, keep moving forward,” Noctis told him the first and last time they got a moment to themselves. Cor could tell he wasn’t just talking about this one battle, his gaze more steady and sure than Cor had ever seen it. Cor stared into the eyes of his third king, King of the Longest Night, and all he could think was that at thirty, Noctis looked so much like his father._ )

Cor opens his eyes, and with Iris against his side and the Citadel at his back, he walks forward into the Dawn.


End file.
